The quality of political reporting in the news media is a focal point of communication research. Politics, however, is not only conveyed via traditional sources of information, but via fictional sources. In particular, political dramas (e. g., The West Wing, Borgen) enjoy great popularity and are often acknowledged for their realistic depiction of politics. Still, little is known about the democratic quality of such fictional depictions. This paper aims to fill the gap by contrasting the depiction of politics in the fictional TV series Borgen with political reporting in a traditional TV magazine (Berlin direkt). The comparative content analysis is based on ten issues that are covered in both formats and focuses on the quality criteria of relevance, pluralism, and democratic discourse norms. Findings show no significant differences between Borgen and Berlin direkt for any of the three criteria, clearly indicating that fictional TV series can offer the same content quality as political reporting.

中文翻译：

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虚构电视娱乐中政治描绘的民主素质。政治戏剧《博尔根》和新闻杂志《柏林直击》的比较内容分析

新闻媒体中政治报道的质量是传播研究的重点。但是，政治不仅通过传统的信息来源传播，而且通过虚构的信息来源传播。特别地，政治戏剧（例如，西翼，博根）享有很高的知名度，并且因其对政治的真实描绘而广为人知。尽管如此，人们对这种虚构描写的民主品质知之甚少。本文旨在通过将虚构的电视连续剧《博尔根》中的政治描述与传统电视杂志中的政治报道进行对比来填补这一空白。比较内容分析基于两种格式都涵盖的十个问题，并着重于相关性，多元性和民主话语规范的质量标准。